in stays, he shall sing it by himself!"

So the Ranters sang till the sound went from the little dissenting
Bethel on the shore up to the stately Kirk of the parish cinctured with
its double acre of ancient grave-stones--

"I love Thy Kingdom, Lord,
The house of Thine abode:
The Church our blest Redeemer saved
With His own precious blood.

For her my tears shall fall,
For her my prayers ascend:
To her my cares and toils be given
Till toils and cares shall end!"

"_And_ three cheers for the Doctor!" shouted swearing Imrie, who had
been worked up by the events of the day to such a pitch of excitement
that only the sound of his own thunderous voice had power to calm him.

And douce Cameronians coming over Eden Valley hill stood still and
wondered at the profanation of the holy day, not knowing. Even sober
pillars of the Kirk Erastian going homeward smiled and shook their heads
pityingly.

"It was doubtless a good thing," said my father to a fellow elder, a
certain McMinn of the Croft, "to see so many of the wild and regardless
at the Kirk, but I'm sore mistaken if there's not some of the old Adam
left in the best of them yet, to judge by the noise they are making down
yonder."

"Except Israel himsel'!" said McMinn of the Croft, "man, dominie, since
he converted Jock, my ploughman, he hasna been drunk yince, and I get
twice the work oot o' the craitur for the same wage."

Which, being the proof of the pudding, settled the question.

CHAPTER XLI

IN THE WOOD PARLOUR

On the 19th of October the sky overhead was clear as sapphire, but all
round the circle of the horizon the mists of autumn blurred the
landscape. The hills stood no more in their places. Gone were the Kips,
with their waving lines. Of the Cruives, with the heather thick and
purple upon them, not a trace. Gone the graceful swirl of the Cooran
Hill, which curls over like a wave just feathering to break.

To Irma it had been a heavy and a sorrowful day. She had actually wept,
and even gone on her knees to her brother to beg him tell her what
strange thing had come between them. He would only answer, "You have
chosen your path without consulting me. Now I choose mine."

She charged him with listening to one who had always been an enemy of
all who had been good to him ever since he was a little child--of
setting himself against those on whose bounty they had lived.

He replied, "If I have lived on th